Henry Shrapnel developed an exploding shell in 1784.
Henry Shrapnel
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Lieutenant General
Henry Shrapnel (3 June 1761 – 13 March 1842) was a
British Army officer whose name has entered the English language as the inventor of the
shrapnel shell.
Henry Shrapnel was born at
Midway Manor in
Bradford-on-Avon,
Wiltshire, England, the ninth child of Zachariah Shrapnel and his wife Lydia.
[1]
In 1784, while a lieutenant in the
Royal Artillery, he perfected, with his own resources, an invention of what he called "spherical case" ammunition: a hollow cannonball filled with lead shot that burst in mid-air. He successfully demonstrated this in 1787 at
Gibraltar.
[2] He intended the device as an anti-personnel weapon.
In 1803, the British Army adopted a similar but elongated explosive shell which immediately acquired the inventor's name.
[3] It has lent the term
shrapnel to
fragmentation from artillery shells and fragmentation in general ever since, long after it was replaced by
high explosive rounds. Until the end of
World War I, the shells were still manufactured according to his original principles.
Shrapnel served in
Flanders, where he was wounded in 1793. He was promoted to major on 1 November 1803 after eight years as a captain. After his invention's success in battle at
Fort New Amsterdam,
Suriname, on 30 April 1804,
[4] Shrapnel was promoted to lieutenant colonel on 20 July 1804, less than nine months later.
In 1814, the British Government recognized Shrapnel's contribution by awarding him
£1200 (UK£ 85,000 in 2021)
[5] a year for life. Bureaucracy however prevented him from receiving the full benefit of this award.
[1] He was appointed to the office of Colonel-Commandant, Royal Artillery, on 6 March 1827. He rose to the rank of lieutenant-general on 10 January 1837.
Shrapnel lived at
Peartree House, near
Peartree Green,
Southampton from about 1835 until his death.
[6][7]